Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe plans to attend the Visegrad Group heads of state meeting in Poland in June reported Japan's Kyodo news agency citing government sources in Tokyo on Friday.
The Japanese news agency has learned that the Japanese prime minister plans to attend the heads of state meeting -- the Visegrad Group incorporating Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia -- because these countries want Japan to increase investment in the region.

Japan has already heavily invested in Eastern Europe, but it wants to develop even closer ties with the countries of the region where China, Japan's main rival, has already started developing tangible economic and political investment programs.

Since taking office in December Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has been striving to be more active than his predecessor in regions such as South-East Asia and Africa where China's influence increased in the recent years.